This is the latest "source" that transphobes are sharing as "evidence" that "biological sex is a simple binary".

I've seen it crop up in multiple threads recently and - as usual - it's deeply flawed to the point of absurdity.

THREAD - 1/20

2/20 - Here's the direct link.

(Apologies for the URL, a direct link to the PDF redirects to a preview, so I had to borrow this from one of the transphobes sharing it.)

https://tinyurl.com/biologicalsexisreal

3/20 - I'm not going to break down the "paper" itself (much), because there's *so little* relevant substance there, it's difficult to actually know where to start.

At its core is the common transphobe argument that "sex" is a magical word that transcends any/all context.

4/20 - The 'argument' (to paraphrase) goes: "If society comes to understand that sex is bimodal (i.e. a spectrum with peaks, not a simple binary) this will prevent science from using the word to describe binary components of sex (e.g. gametes) with (vague) disastrous results".

5/20 - The author supports this assertion with no evidence - and not even an *argument*. It's simply introduced as established fact, and not the shameless non sequitur it *transparently* is.

This sentence - for instance - could just have read "because reasons".

6/20 - Of course, common usage of the word "sex" is *distinctly* different from its use in medical/biological/legal contexts. And transphobes are wrong about all of them, just differently so.

When most people discuss sex - or gender - "gametes" rarely feature prominently.

7/20 - When birth certificates are corrected, it's the "sex" field that changes.

This is (among other reasons) why transphobes pursue this semantic non-argument - it's another avenue towards preventing trans people having their identities legally recognized.

8/20 - Even in science alone, "sex" has different meanings in different contexts - as demonstrated below (a great thread I will keep sharing no matter how many bigots pretend "but that person is a *marine* biologist" somehow refutes the facts therein): https://twitter.com/RebeccaRHelm/status/1207834357639139328?s=20

9/20 - Anyway - back to the paper - the author dives *deep* into the science of genetics... but makes no effort to actually tie these principles to the core argument.

The science is just decoration - lending credibility to what, by design, is a piece of bigoted propaganda.

10/20 - The only thing worth saying about the science is that - while it is (probably) correct - it's also irrelevant and deliberately narrow, ignoring most of the full topic (see the thread above & more below).

And - when you look at the wider context - it becomes clear why.

11/20 - The first thing you should know about the paper is that it's not really a paper.

When people discuss academic papers, they're generally talking about new research (or aggregations of old research to form new insight).

This is neither.

12/20 - Some of those sharing it are falsely claiming it was published in Nature - one of (if not *the*) leading scientific journals on the planet.

It was actually published in "Academic Questions" - an obscure journal from a group called the "National Association of Scholars".

13/20 - The Nature disinfo originates from the preprint being provided by the SpringerNature archive (which lists hundreds of journals alongside those they publish themselves).

The paper does *cite* Nature though - as one of many sources that disagrees. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-07238-8

14/20 - The NAS is a pro-Trump, conservative astroturf group (or, in this case, astroterf) whose principle objective is to manufacture credibility for (far) right-wing talking points, using the pretence of "legitimate" scholarly debate.

15/20 - You can learn more about this organisation (including its funding and connections to any number of similar right-wing propaganda factories) here: https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=National_Association_of_Scholars

16/20 - Anyone familiar with the "Gender Critical" movement will be unsurprised by it "accidentally" promoting US far-right propaganda.

Yet again, these "defenders of women" are sharing material from an organisation denounced by other academics as "racist, sexist, & homophobic".

17/20 - The whole paper is little more than an opinion piece into which someone has accidentally copy/pasted part of a genetics text-book (a mistake now known as a "reverse Rowling").

And it makes no effort to hide this, referring to opposing arguments as "dogma" and "insanity".

18/20 - The author presents no new research & cites no supporting evidence whatsoever.

The few references provided are either opposing viewpoints or support for (irrelevant) points from the text-book section.

It is propaganda masquerading as science.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astroturfing

19/20 - There will *always* be academics willing to write anti-science nonsense - transphobia is just the latest in a grand tradition dating back through climate change and tobacco.

But the *overwhelming majority* of biologists understand that, in humans, sex is a bimodal trait.

20/20 - If you want a legitimate academic article on the widely-and-long-term-accepted scientific fact that biological sex is bimodal, I recommend starting here.

For those wanting full scientific journals, many directly-relevant papers are cited therein. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/voices/stop-using-phony-science-to-justify-transphobia/